Herman Cain: Revising Tax Code Will Create Parity

Conservative businessman Herman Cain, who is considering a 2012 presidential run, says the nation’s tax code must be revised, because as long as it remains in current form politicians will continue to use the rules to pander to the electorate. Cain also told Fox News’ Neal Cavuto Monday raising taxes is not an alternative to creating taxpayer parity.

“The answer is not to continue to talk about, as President [Barack] Obama is talking about, raising taxes on the rich — the answer is not let’s end the Bush-era tax cuts,” Cain said. “First of all, they are not Bush tax cuts — they are the Bush tax rates — they have been around for 10 years. Give me a break. Why do you keep wanting to put Bush`s name on them? And now we still have this uncertainty of two more years before we know what is going to happen.

“The answer, Neil, is we need to lower tax rates for everybody, starting with the top corporate tax rate — we need to simplify the tax code,” he continued. “The ultimate answer — in my opinion — is the Fair Tax, which is a fair tax for everybody, because as long as we still have this messed-up tax code, the politicians are going to use it to reward winners and losers.”

Cain said the problem is “the pandering on the part of the liberals, primarily the Democrats, over the years always wanting to provide another tax favor to someone.”

“When the politicians — some of them — want to get re-elected, they make some promises . . . the tax code is so complex, that is used by the people in Washington to reward winners and losers,” he said. “It’s like a crapshoot every time they want to change the tax code. And they will use the same old pandering rhetoric: Well, the rich ought to pay more.

“Well, look, the numbers that you have used at the beginning of the show says the rich are already paying an inordinate share,” Cain continued. “I think that taxes would be fair if we first get rid of the tax code. This is the ultimate solution — not to just say we`re going to trim around the edges — not to say that we will try to simplify a little of this and a little of that.

“Replace the tax code, so we can establish tax fairness for everybody — and, no, it is not regressive on the poor, like the liberals try to demagogue the whole idea of moving toward a Fair Tax, which is a single-rate retail consumption tax.”

Conservative businessman Herman Cain, who is considering a 2012 presidential run, says the nation s tax code must be revised, because as long as it remains in current form politicians will continue to use the rules to pander to the electorate. Cain also told Fox News Neal...